The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2038: Amazing Spider-Man #415, October 1996

 

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I'm having a bit of a pain day today, so I'll talk a bit more about the "Onslaught" crossover tomorrow. Which might be more appropriate because, really, not much happens to further the plot in today's comic.

And there's two Peter Parkers? What's that all about?

(Yes, I know it's the infamous Clone Saga. I'm being facetious.)

 So, I like Mr. Bagley's art - he of Thunderbolts can do no wrong. And, as far as superheroes battling giant robots, it did the trick. But not much else.

 More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2037: Generation X #19, September 1996

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I find it appropriate that I return to blogging (after a fucking month!) with a series of which I'm quite overly fond. I loved The New Mutants, and Generation X was a fantastic follow-up to the tales of young mutants that I grew up with. While the whole mutant metaphor is very useful for telling stories about marginalized groups, the onset of mutation, in puberty, also makes it a perfect vehicle for telling stories about growing up.

 So, a month off, and my wrists and thumbs are slightly better, but not much. The job I'm doing now is not super great for my pain, but it's a worthwhile endeavour, and I've had so many people tell me how appreciative they are for my efforts. Who knew that delivering groceries would be so fulfilling?

 That said, we're well into the Onslaught crossover here. I don't have all of the parts, but I figured I had enough to finally sit down and read a good, multi-title event. I think I probably got most of the parts of this crossover from my initial purchase of a comic collection from Cover to Cover Books when I was in the process of opening up my comic store. I started getting back into comics around the time that this crossover was happening, but I was much more into DC at the time.

The crossover itself is pretty great, and though there were subsequent problems, the Image-led reboots of The Avengers, The Fantastic Four, Iron Man, and Captain America were not terrible. Once Liefeld left, anyway. My Marvel re-introduction actually came from one of the series that spins out of this crossover, the amazing, fantastic Thunderbolts. I'll say a bit more about the actual Onslaught event tomorrow.

I love Generation X, particularly this initial Scott Lobdell/Chris Bachalo run. Mr. Bachalo's sense of panel layout and composition is just amazing. He and Mr. Lobdell seem unafraid to be very explicit about the materiality of their medium, breaking the fourth wall constantly and placing a sometimes Greek Chorus-level of exposition and commentary outside of the action of the comic. It's hard to describe, but today's comic is introduced by a talking toad whom we follow from event to event through the comic. Have I mentioned at all that this is actually a very strange comic, quite unlike the rest of the X-titles from the same era? Probably why I like it so much.

So, I'm back, hopefully. We'll see if I can keep it up.

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Posts

A few more pieces on Chris Bachalo.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1914: Cynder / Hellina Special, 1996

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 An odd comic. I think that the various series that came out featuring Cynder must have comprised a single story, as I was definitely coming in in the middle of something here. Cynder has been badly wounded, and is rescued by Hellina, who just happens to show up after jumping from her own publisher, Lightning. And....stuff happens, they fight a crime boss, and they make the world momentarily safer for we regular humans. Thank goodness there are busty women in leather leaping from rooftop to rooftop saving us from supernatural threats.

I know, and I agree - that would be awesome if it was real. BDSM superheroes - aren't they all, really?

Is there something to be said about the similarities between these kinds of exploitative female superheroes and magical girls? There's the element of the mystical about them, the drive to take up the powers in order to right wrongs - it's simply that this particular iteration is very much focussed through the male gaze. So, too, are many magical girl stories, to be sure. Hmmm. Just a random thought.

The art was pretty good in this comic, really drawing (pun intended) on the styles of the time. I can see all of the early Image founders in this comic, and few of the later artists. I do my best not to hold such things against a comic. Yes, the art might be slightly derivative, but isn't that what art does? It seeps out into the world and influences. I think the key is whether or not that influence eventually transforms into an innovative bent in an artist's work. It's no good if you just stay one way forever.

I for Immortelle
A hero of fire
With all the leather and boobs
That you could desire.

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Links

I've only read one other Hellina comic - warning, probably NSFW.

But I've definitely read a few more comics in the "bad girl" genre.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1806: Invasion Book Two, 1988

To be honest, this was a pretty decent superhero war comic. It really read like the old war comics from DC's past, and actually kind of combined the B-Movie alien invasion aesthetic that was popular in film at the same time that war comics flourished. Not sure if that's a calculated move on Mr. Giffen's part, but it works quite nicely.

On the other hand, it's fairly propagandistic, really. Somehow North America is the only continent to avoid catastrophic damage, forcing the rest of the world to rely on America. Again, this echoes the war comics of old, but it rings pretty hollow in the Reagan-era Cold War. I think by this point in time, people were becoming a lot more suspect about the glories of war. This one doesn't really address the horrors that, in the background, appear to have been perpetuated.

In terms of comparison with the Arrowverse crossover, this is the big superhero throw-down that the CW just couldn't afford to do. First, they don't have nearly enough heroes, and second I don't imagine they have the budget for large-scale space warfare effects. Though the Dominators' reason for attacking Earth remains the same, the emergence of high-power metahumans, their methods are decidedly different on screen. A pity, but an understandable one.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1804: Invasion Book One, 1988

80 pages is a lot to get through in one sitting. But when the 80 pages are a Keith Giffen/Bill Mantlo/Todd McFarlane production, it's not such a bad thing.

I originally picked up Invasion because it crossed over with Animal Man. The eventual outcome of the alien plan really messes with Animal Man's powers, and spurs a very cool story line in which everything we thought we knew about Animal Man turns out to be wrong. That sort of thing happens to him frequently.

In a lot of ways, and much more so than when I first read the series, I can see the aliens' point of view. Here's Earth, this insignificant little world that keeps churning out individuals of incalculable power, sometimes presenting a cosmos-wide danger. And, by and large, they're a pretty violent bunch. Imagine a creature like that became capable of intergalactic travel. They're right to be scared.

But there's also something deeply disturbing about the fact that all of the aliens (an important word) look exactly the same, and have no genetic variance. Further, they are identified by a single trait that characterized their race. And it's only humanity (and, let's be honest, North American humanity) that presents this strange diversity of genetics and potential.

Which is all to say that, as a part of my Doom Patrol read-through, the Doom Patrol don't appear in this issue. Only Adam Strange makes an appearance, and an ill-fated one at that. Instead, as the title of this volume attests, we witness the formation of the Alien Alliance. It's actually a remarkable bit of storytelling, in that it's basically a prologue to the crossover. It seems to me that this is a crossover that might have used its tie-in issues very well, in that the actual first strike on American soil takes place in the pages of the individual titles, as discrete events. When we come back next issue, those events have happened, and we're on to the next phase. I'm not explaining this right. The crossover series is designed to provide context to the events of the individual tie-ins. As such it is useful regardless of which series you are following it through, nor do you need to read all of the tie-ins.

At least, that's what it looks like at the moment.

In terms of comparison to the Arrowverse crossover, this similarly functions nicely as a prologue, but, honestly, the only similarity is the Dominator head design. I understand, of course, that it would have been too expensive to have all of the alien races present, but we've seen enough humanoid ones that there could have been at least a small alliance. What the comic crossover does that the television one doesn't is give us the reason for the Dominators' invasion. In the Arrowverse, they're just aliens there to experiment on human beings - it's more of a secret invasion than an invasion. Watching the television crossover from the perspective of the Dominators fear of metahumans is going to be interesting, though if I'm to be completely honest, I don't remember how the TV one all turns out, so things might change by next issue.

I am feeling a bit spacey today. Can you tell?

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1584: Uncanny X-Men #212, December 1986

Where to start with this one?

When this comic came out, it skyrocketed in price. According to all the sources I can find, this is the first time Wolverine and Sabertooth face one another. Sabertooth was originally introduced as an unpowered assassin in Chris Claremont's Iron Fist, and subsequently found his way into X-Men history via this crossover. Claremont has gone on record saying that Sabertooth was always meant to be Wolverine's father, and the dialogue in today's issue really does reinforce that. Wolverine's expositional captions reveal that the two have a history together, a subtle retcon, but page 14 of the story gives us their first published meeting.

I think that even by this point, I was getting sick of Wolverine. I wonder if anyone's done any work on Logan's dialogue in 80s X-Men comics in comparison to the clipped style of Frank Miller's Dark Knight. I really think Wolverine, and the way he was depicted in the early to mid 80s, influenced the Grim'n'Gritty (TM) aesthetic that overtook comics in the wake of Dark Knight. Regardless, even this early into my X-Men reading I noticed the ridiculous over-exposure of the X-Men's resident Canadian. He's still overused and over-rated, IMHO, but there's a lot of people out there who love him to bits.

What else? Rick Leonardi's guest pencils on the issue are just beautiful. He reminds me of Halo Jones' Ian Gibson, though with a more American inflection. His ability to communicate movement in a static frame is just amazing. This comic includes, even outside of the Wolverine/Sabertooth scuffle, some beautifully-drawn action sequences. And the characters have extremely expressive faces, something not always in evidence, particularly in the more violent era of superheroes that this issue heralds.

Another interesting thing about this crossover in general is that after that first, violent foray in X-Men 210-211 and X-Factor 9-10, most of the story is aftermath. The Morlocks, for the most part, are dead by the time we get to the crossover issues and the rest of the main series story. The Marauders are vanishing back to wherever they came from, mopping up a few final stragglers. Like I said in an earlier post, it's the teams reacting to a level of violence that they have a hard time resisting at the beginning. Now, later into the story, it's about them returning to the scene of the crime to see if there's anything left that they can do.

"Coulda chopped you smooth as sin while you were dreamin', bub!"

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1583: Power Pack #27, December 1986

I never was too keen on Power Pack, and rightly so, as it was aimed at a younger demographic than what I was when the series began. Just about, anyway. This is not to say that the series is not entertaining, provocative, or well-rendered. Louise Simonson and (original artist/creator) June Brigman are amongst the powerhouse women who persevered in comics at a time when female creators were a true rarity. And the longevity of the characters attests to the talent and inspiration that went into the original series.

That said, this issue is almost, but only almost, one that could be skipped in the crossover. The Pack descends into the Alley to help their young friend Leech and runs afoul of a number of Marauders. There's something interesting to be noted here about tailoring a story for a demographic, and also of age-related inflection across multiple series. Other titles in this crossover have been very, very bloody, and the Marauders shown as a team that can take down both major teams of X-Men. So to see Power Pack take on Sabretooth, Arclight, Scrambler, and Harpoon and survive with barely a scratch takes quite a bit of suspension of disbelief when reading from the perspective of the rest of the story. What the comic is accomplishing, I think, is what many stories for younger audiences do: showing kids that they have agency and can take power in their own lives. On the metaphoric stage of the superhero comic, this makes itself known in the ability of these children to repel even the most brutal of killers.

I don't know whether this issue or tomorrow's Uncanny #212 was released first, but if it's Power Pack, the cover may well be the first skirmish between Wolverine and Sabertooth. Although, in a bit of false advertising, the two don't actually meet in the pages of this comic. But tomorrow...

"Let's see how she likes getting slammed with a condensed rock hard Julie hammer!"

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1582: Thor #373, November 1986

Earlier on in my reading of this crossover, I noted that there were issues that were not necessary for enjoyment of the story. I'm going to revise this statement. As I read through, I've noticed that each issue is telling an important part of this tale, with one or two possible exceptions. Today's issue, much like yesterday's tells an integral part of the Massacre storyline, specifically its impact on X-Factor and on Angel. This issue has got to mark one of the very last appearances, at least for a few decades, of the traditional Warren Worthington III as Angel. Shortly after the events of the crossover, Angel is "recruited" by Apocalypse and becomes Archangel, a look and character revision that sticks around for quite some time, and heralds the beginnings of Marvel's attempt to become grittier in the late 80s and early 90s.

I've been very much enjoying the Thor comics I've been reading over the last little while. I've heard fabulous things about Walt Simonson's run on the title, though I only have a few issues of it. I'm sure it's been reprinted, so perhaps I'll have to save up my pennies.

Thor's involvement in this crossover speaks to his commitment to Earth and its people, including the disenfranchised beneath the streets of New York. Thor is often compared to Superman, favourably, in comparisons of the various heroes and teams in their respective universes. Though much of this has to do with Thor's extremely high power levels, it also has to do with his desire to connect with humanity, and to serve them as best he can. I've written extensively about this relationship between humanity and divinity from the Superman perspective. I'm curious how Thor's relationships and narratives speak to this idea, considering that rather than being an original hero, these stories are meant to be continuations of a much longer mythic history. Fodder for the next degree, perhaps?

"I think my old friend Puddlegulp has recognized me even though I...I was not wearing a beard when last we met."

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1581: The New Mutants #46, December 1986

What's interesting about The New Mutants is that when I first read the series, the team were my contemporaries. Now, not so much.

An important break in the action as the X-Men return to the mansion, the wounded and dying in tow. I'd forgotten that the events of this crossover are really where the roots of Excalibur are sown, and I can't help but wonder if Chris Claremont had it in mind at the time. The younger team, capricious youth that they are, manage to make the crisis about themselves (well, Roberto does, for sure), and much of the action is spent with the team dealing with their own shit rather than the tragedy unfolding beneath their feet. They actually came across as a bit bratty in this issue. Let your stuff go for a moment and go help the people who are dying. But teenagers often, not always but often, can't see that perspective. It's simply the stage in their brain and ego development, so we can't really blame them, but, gods, it's irritating sometimes. I'm a little worried about reading this series again now.

That aside, I was, I must admit, overcome with some nostalgia for the characters. I love Warlock and Cypher's relationship (which, as I type this, I realize it's because it's clearly a queer relationship, though what becomes of it is a bit troubling), and despite his "aw shucks" dialogue, I love Cannonball too. And, of course, I crushed hard on Rhane back in the day. Didn't she die recently?

But how does this play into the crossover? Do we need it or not? We definitely do. It tells an intrinsic part of the story, the return and regroup of the team, dropping off their wounded and then planning their return. Or, more likely, their defense. Despite this fact, the New Mutants head out on their own to check on Karma's siblings, and are suddenly confronted by Magus, Warlock's Dad. He's nuts.

We'll have to leave the resolution of that story til I re-read this series. We'll see. I've had it on my radar for a little while now, especially the Bill Sienkiwicz stuff. But do I have the patience to jump back into not only the teen angst, but the 80s?

"I know they're not your style, but they're the best that I can do."

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1580: X-Factor #10, November 1986

Sorry for the pause. Went camping for a couple of days. I find it very therapeutic.

A commenter on my Instagram mentioned how much they enjoy this crossover, and I have to agree. Basically what we have is the original X-Men and the current team stumbling back from some serious beatdown into the middle of a massacre. Someone is just outright slaughtering the Morlocks. And, as of this issue, they've had their asses handed to them again and again, and only just escaped death themselves, so they're picking everyone they can and getting the hell out! Both teams! In contrast to so many of the crossovers we see now, this one is pretty tiny. The surface world would be affected in no way. But the fashion now is for the heroes to throw themselves at it, whatever the magnitude, and just trust that they'll win. I kind of appreciate seeing one where the heroes are thinking "Fuck! This is insane. We gotta rescue who we can and get the fuck out!" We don't see nearly enough of that.

The other great thing about the crossover is that it works. It's a wonderful meshing of stories, there are a mere 5 crossover issues, and only 3 in each main series are given to the story. The first X-Men and X-Factor titles are really more epilogues to their previous stories, the massacre itself only happening on the last page or two. Two of the five crossover issues are actually not completely pertinent to the plot, offering more a view of the consequences, rather than the action, of the events of the main story. Regardless, it's a neatly told story, and I think serves as a template for these kinds of "Events." Rather than involve everyone, make them more intimate. This story is claustrophobic and unpleasant, and is super-effective, much more than the yearly get together to save the universe.

I have discovered of late that there is an issue that crosses over that isn't on the map in the back of the comics, Daredevil #238. Off to the shops I go!

"It'll take more than that to stop me, little piggies..."

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1577: Uncanny X-Men #210, October 1986

Aside from reading the "Age of Apocalypse" back in the first year of the project, they've been mostly absent from my writing. I started out liking the team, but they just became too mired down in continuity, and too mired down in their own metaphorical nature. I picked this issue up and was struck by the fact that Marvel basically tries to commit genocide against a group of people every few years with the X-Men. What if we instead tried showing a world that doesn't hate and fear them, but accepts them? Perhaps then life might imitate art for a bit.

Despite that, I loved, and still love, this crossover. I think it was one of Marvel's first bit crossovers, and the GCD lists it as the first X-Men crossover issue. That's a dubious honour, considering some of the crossovers that followed. This one, though, unlike many of those that follow, seems very personal. There's something intimate about the way the Marauders cut a swath through the Morlocks. It's got a claustrophobic setting that bleeds out into everything about the comic. This is my era of X-Men, when I discovered the mutant corner of the Marvel U and found a metaphor blunt enough to speak to my 12-year old brain.

Enjoyable as it is, I will say that Chris Claremont's style in this series has not aged well. Colossus has waaaaay too many internal soliloquies, as do, honestly, all of the other characters in the book. There's so much exposition that, really, doesn't need to be there. Contemporary comics allow that the reader has some experience of the world, and some intelligence, and don't spell everything out for you. I wonder what it would be like to remaster some of these old stories into contemporary aesthetics.

More massacred mutants tomorrow.

"What I wish, comrade Piotr Nikolievitch Rasputin -- what I really want -- is a super hot fudge quad-scoop sundae bananarama split with all the trimmings."

There is Only One Sound in All-Star Superman:Thoughts on Focalisation and Sound

There is only one sound effect in All-Star Superman.

Bear with me for a moment.

I think that the cold open for season 1, episode 21 of Brooklyn Nine-Nine is, hands down, the best one they do. The set-up is simple, seems to go in a direction we’ve seen before, and then veers off and becomes a beautiful study in character development. Andre Braugher’s expression at the end is one of the best performances I’ve ever seen. Have a look:

If the Netflix series summary is to be believed, we’re meant to experience Brooklyn Nine-Nine through the perspective of Andy Samberg’s character, Jake Peralta. We refer to this character in a narrative as the “focal character.” Simply, it is the character through which we focus our perceptions. ‘Niederhoff (2011) proposes that focalisation “may be defined as a selection or restriction of narrative information in relation to the experience and knowledge of the narrator, the characters or other, more hypothetical entities in the storyworld.”’ In the television series, Peralta sees Holt as a robotic Captain, so that aspect is played up in the comedy. Peralta’s perspective on the world of the show is the one we are expected to adopt.

In a medium like television, there are numerous ways to achieve this focalisation, such as the aforementioned utilisation of Peralta’s perspective to accentuate comedic moments, even when Peralta himself is not present. But another way that it can be achieved is through sound. In this particular case, the non-diegetic sound that signals the shift in Peralta’s understanding of the situation.

Go back and watch the clip. At 57 seconds, we hear a rattling sound. Aside from some background music, another indicator of the shift in tone of course, this is the first non-diegetic sound we’ve heard. It’s not really music. As Holt leans in, and his behaviour goes from robotic to something a bit more fluid, a snake-like rattle belies the fact that Peralta is about to be struck. Even the movement of Holt’s body at the end, as he pulls away, is serpentine. We’re removed from the more jovial atmosphere of the police precinct, created by the familiar diegetic sounds we hear in each episode, by a single sound effect, one that shifts atmosphere through a realigning of the perspective of the focal character.

But what does this have to do with comics, a largely silent medium, and All-Star Superman?

There is only one sound effect in All-Star Superman.

Chapter 3 begins with an invasion from the center of the Earth, led by the Prince of the Subterranosauri, a race of intelligent dinosaurs. You’ll note on that first page, there is smoke billowing, there are dinosaur soldiers rushing about behind, and an entire car is being lifted up into the air. But in that whole panel the only sound that is transmitted is Kull’s voice. The situation is similar for the Daily Planet reporters watching the scene unfold on the following page, until the fifth panel. Jimmy Olsen, Superman’s Pal, has sent his friend a signal, a signal only Superman can hear, the tiny “Zee zee, zee zee” we see superimposed (a word I use purposefully) over his hand. Is it not strange that we cannot hear the crashes of violence and chaos on the first page, nor anywhere on the second? Surely these sounds are wafting up to the watching reporters. Of course they are.

Later in the chapter, in which Superman bestows upon Lois Lane powers identical to his own for one day (LOIS: What is it? – SUPERMAN: My superpowers. In liquid form. Happy Birthday, Lois. – LOIS: You’re serious? I get to be like you? For a whole day?), Superwoman also comments on Jimmy’s watch. As her powers wear off she notes that she’ll “never have to put up the annoying zee zee zee of Jimmy Olsen’s Super-watch” ever again.

Of course, these examples are only from a single chapter of the book. However, in the very next chapter, as Jimmy spends a day on the Moon, this occurs:

Note once again that a chaotic and presumably noisy event is depicted without any sound effects whatsoever. Until, again, that last panel, in which the “Zee zee zee” of Jimmy’s watch is “heard” once more.

Take a moment, if you have the book, and flip through. There are no other sound effects. The only one that we ever hear is one that only Superman can hear.

So what shall we make of this? You can make what you like of it, really, but here’s my reading: When I teach sound in poetry, through alliterative and assonant phrasings, I suggest that the inclusion of this sound is intentional, just as I believe the use of this single sound in the series is intentional. As with the example from Brooklyn Nine-Nine, I argue that this sound effect aids in focalising us into Superman’s perspective. We are meant to understand this story through the lens of the Man of Steel. It is, after all, called All-Star Superman. We all star as the main character.

One of the main concerns of this series is the meeting of the mortal and the divine. Superman bestows upon Lois his powers, but only for a day. Jimmy is injected with the Doomsday formula, a human attempt to replicate the divine, which ends disastrously. The ancient Kryptonian astronauts later in the story fall from the heavens as divinities, but find themselves corrupted by the remnants of their own homeworld, divinity here shown to have to adapt to mortal surroundings or perish. Lex Luthor acquires Superman’s powers as well, and in the end realizes the truth of all divinity – it was never meant to make us harm one another, only love one another. It was created to stop us from being the animals that we so often are. Lex simply cannot handle this.

I’ve written elsewhere of the significance of chapter 10 of this work, in which we witness ostensibly the real world creation of Superman as a fictional character. But if we consider that the work is focalised through this character, that it is this particular perspective on events through which we are meant to understand the narrative, then this chapter takes on further significance. Each of the connections with the divine through the narrative are unsuccessful. Even the Superman-enabled Lois Lane only has her powers for a day, as does Luthor, and is worn and exhausted as they fade. Only one connection to these powers, this character, a metonym for “essential goodness,” the constitution of which Ben Saunders calls “one of the more beautiful challenges that postindustrial popular culture ever produced for itself” (from Saunders’ excellent book Do the Gods Wear Capes?), is successful in the story. And that is the “creation” of Superman at the hands of Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster. Further, we see the success of this connection by the very fact that this event is being chronicled in a comic book the cover date of which is one month shy of the 70^th anniversary of Superman’s first appearance.

The argument here appears to be that not only do we create the divinities we come to worship, but that the stories we tell of them really are the only ways we should try to embody, imitate, or access those divinities. We should never try to be them, nor should we ever think we know what a divinity wants. All we have are their stories. And, further, we should always recall their fictional nature. There’s nothing wrong with admitting that the thing you turn to for solace isn’t real. Just because a thing isn’t real doesn’t mean that it’s not true. If truth depended on reality, we would not have literature. In All-Star Superman, Morrison and Quitely provide us with the means to achieve this connection. As the book focalises through Superman, we are given a brief, 12-chapter glimpse into what it is like to live his life, to experience “reality” at divine levels. A question that is often posed to the Man of Steel is how he can possibly stand all of the noise his super-hearing must subject him to. All-Star shows us how he copes. I read this series with a sense of vast white noise behind it, punctuated only now and then by the sound he is listening for, the signal of Jimmy's watch. But still, it is only a taste, not a neverending ride, though chapter 10, itself entitled “Neverending,” suggests that the re-reading of these texts, and the re-conceptualizing of these texts, is the only way to be constantly in touch with the divine.

I’ve recently finished re-reading this book, paying close attention, and there really is only one sound in All-Star Superman, but it is a sound that connects us to an avatar of goodness. It offers clear direction as to how we are to understand the events of the story and the perspective of the narrative, and it allows us to see the answer to the question “What would Superman do?” And, to end on a hopeful note, it lets us hear the hero that lives within.

Preliminary Thoughts on Inflection Theory: Crossovers

I'm going to get back to writing about these interesting events, especially as they are now making their way into the televisual universes the comics have spawned.

Reading a crossover is sometimes like creating your own novel from pre-existing modules. For example, I'm reading Secret Invasion right now, and I'm including in it all the crossovers that I have. But I don't necessarily have to. I could read just the main series and still get the major events of the story. Add in the Avengers titles, you get a broader, more satisfying story. I would contend that this is the "necessary" reading of this crossover - without both New Avengers and Mighty Avengers, the main story doesn't quite make sense. It's still the same series of events, but more minutely. Add in ancillary titles, in my case the Fantastic Four and Runaways/Young Avengers mini-series, and the story is still broader, though still adhering to a particular chronological scale. I could, of course, choose to leave out the Runaways/Young Avengers book, and read only the "A-List" heroes (thought sometimes the FF slides down to that B-List). If I had more crossovers, I could read the crossover from a street-level perspective, perhaps the She-Hulk crossover, or the Spider-Man one. Or go international and add the Captain Britain title to see what the Skrulls did in the U.K. Each read of it would include different iterations of these events, interacting differently depending on which are mixed with which, telling the same story from a myriad of points of view.

So is this an inflectionary reading? Imagine Secret Invasion, the series, as a framework. It is a series of required moments in a sequence that constitute a basic story. Around this framework, depending on the tie-ins that one chooses, we inflect this framework story with detail - setting, genre, mythicness(?). And the particular inflecting texts we choose also inflect one another. Reading Avengers only turns the story into a Cold War, Tom Clancy-esque action-spy thriller (how's that for a specific genre?). However, the main series and the first three issues of Deadpool would be a very different reading experience. And that foundation would be inflected to become part of the kind of slapstick, meta-storytelling that Deadpool carries with it.

And then suppose we added Captain Britain and MI13? More spy thriller, international vibe, but also inflected by the meta aspect of Deadpool.

Is this fractal comics? Or is it more of a Deleuze and Guattari-ian rhizome? I suppose the entire history of the Marvel Universe is really one large crossover. That would be something to read.

But if we do go with that idea, that the entirety of the publishing history of the Marvel Universe, wherever that beginning point might be, is one prolonged crossover, the shared narrative universe, then inflection starts to bend genre. Allowing that the superhero, embodied by the Fantastic Four and the Avengers, and their ancillary titles to a certain extent, are the baseline, we can inflect the superheroic myth with other generic conventions.

This is something I've been working out in my brain for quite some time. One of the ways I consider my time in grad school is that I was developing a set of concepts and languages with which I could articulate this idea of an inflectionary reading of a shared narrative universe. I think I'll start working it out a bit more over the next few months.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1266: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #0, September 1994

This one's gonna have to wait too. My wife's leaving for Europe and things are in a bit of chaos at the Miller household!

On second thought. This was an utterly uninspired crossover. I don't want to say anything more about it.

More tomorrow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1265: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #1, September 1994

Ugh.

Early 90s DC really was a mess. This series was obviously designed, in part, to bolster interest in some of the newer characters that DC had introduced, but they're so bland that by the time they've been erased from reality, you're not really that bothered. I often wonder, when I see a crop of these "new gods" spring from the pages of a venerable mythic structure like the DCU, whether any of them will go the same kind of distance as their progenitors. A similar thing is happening again at DC in the wake of the Metal Knights event. I think. I didn't follow it at all.

The other thing I'm trying to figure is the utter hate on DC seemed to have for Hal Jordan in this era. I know he went evil, but they seem to go out of their way to make him super-fucking-evil. It's a strange treatment for one of their more iconic characters.

Not that I mind. I really liked Kyle Rayner.

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1264: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #2, September 1994

Gah. Does the "crisis in time" involve my lost time from reading this series? They've lost me. Can you tell? Somehow Extant, who is also Monarch from "Armageddon 2001," and who is also Hawk, of Hawk and Dove, and has Waverider's powers to manipulate space and time, also has a couple of teams of superheroes under his control, and it's never actually explained how this happened, except to tell us on the last page that it's explained in the Team Titans ongoing series.

And that's where they lose me.

This was a major plot point of the entire issue, but there's no reason or logic to it unless you've read an ancillary title that you might not actually be reading regularly to begin with. Once line-wide crossovers started pulling stuff like this, they lost what the crossover was meant to accomplish - all your favourite heroes in one story together, and that story made, as much as superhero stories do, sense. The original Crisis did this par excellance, as did Hickman's Secret Wars. I read Crisis with no other context for the DCU except that I knew of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. And the series made sense. The first Secret Wars is the same. I didn't have to read any of the other ongoing series to get a good, complete story.

I've ranted about this before, but I think it bears repeating. Not only is it, in my opinion, rude for a company to expect us to spend even more of what little we earn on comics we wouldn't normally want to buy, but it's also demonstrating some class-based exclusion. In a lot of ways it's saying that if you can afford it, you can get the whole story, but if you can't, then you get an incomplete experience. And that's not fair, and it's certainly not how art or media should be. But, unfortunately, it is.

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1263: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #3, September 1994

I hadn't realized that this was a weekly event - I was about to complain that all kinds of stuff is alluded to in this issue that we never see, and that that's a sign, to me at least, of poor writing. But with a weekly crossover, you have the ability to so stuff like that. I think the DC One Million crossover is just about the most perfect line-wide weekly crossover I've ever seen. Perhaps some of the failings I'm noticing - rough pacing, moments that should be dramatic but lack any gravitas - are a result of not reading the crossover as it's envisioned, as a line-wide story.

Given the dodgy era that the story comes from, I'm not certain I want to track the issues down. DC was just finishing up with its experiments with grittier, Image-esque superheros, but Starman and The Flash, under Robinson and Waid respectively, were leading the DCU back to a place in which I think it flourished. But then, I quite like that Morrison guy who came on not too long after this.

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1262: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #4, September 1994

Let's just take a complete, 180 degree turn, and read some sort of crappy early 90s DC, shall we?

*sigh*

Another crisis. Granted, this is one of the earlier ones, but I think by this time, DC had figured out that they could make scads of cash doing multi-part crossovers. The one thing I will give Zero Hour is that it introduces Jack Knight, the best Starman, and one of the best superheroes, I've ever read.

That aside, meh.

I'll keep reading the rest of the series, and maybe some of the zero issues I have, but it's pretty run of the mill. I keep worrying that I'm judging these things by the standards I have now - crises like this weren't a dime a dozen back then, or not as much as they are now. But I think even by this point, they were getting a bit ridiculous. This is also around the time that the X-franchise seemed to have two or three major event crossovers every year.

Not that things are much better these days, though I do feel it might have slowed down a bit. Or, perhaps, I've stopped paying quite as much attention as I once did.

More to come...

The 40 Years of Comics Project - The Bi-Weekly Graphic Novel Number 66 - Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways, 2007

In my spare time, rather than glut on any television, I've been binging New Avengers, starting right at issue #1. It's a really great run of comics, all the way through. I was sold on Mr. Bendis right there and then. His gift for dialogue is where the bar should be set. But I'll get to that stuff, y'know, eventually.

Fairly early into the run, we get the mega-crossover "Civil War." Not to be confused with the similarly-titled, yet completely unrelated, film. Well, mostly completely unrelated. Civil War is one of those stories that only really makes sense in retrospect, knowing from afterward who was manipulating things, and how the war played into this. By itself, it's a bit flawed, though this time around I read as much of the crossover as I have, and the bigger picture is confusing and confounding. As most large-scale crossovers, and real-life political stories, often are. And in that it is successful.

This particular little section is okay, but not great. The Young Avengers, seeing that the Runaways might need some counselling from more mainstream heroes their own age, get into the inevitable hero smackdown before a tentative alliance is formed when Marvel Boy is sent by S.H.I.E.L.D. to take them all down.

For me, the best part of this story is the end, at which point (SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT) the Runaways reject both sides of the conflict, citing the notion that it's just adults screwing everything up, regardless of which side you choose. I think perhaps this, for me, is the aspect of the Runaways comics that the television show just hasn't quite grasped. These kids are anarchists. They're not interested in what the adult world has to offer. They're interested in the world they can make.

If they're left alone, that is.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1067: Deathmate Blue, October 1993

So I'm having a pain day, and I'm quite medicated. Apologies if this rambles a bit.

Our first (and only?) sojourn of Supreme into another company's universe. Sort of. I am only very vaguely aware of the characters published by Valiant Comics. I read some of their stuff under the Acclaim banner, but they'd sort of fizzled out in the mid-90s when I got back into comics. I know some about the old Dell characters they have, and some about the original properties, and I've had the recent Valiant stuff highly recommended to me. I just can't get past them not having Christopher Priest back to write Quantum & Woody. Criminal, if you ask me.

What's pretty neat about this issue is that we get a real glimpse into Supreme's character. In fact, it's so significant a glimpse that I wonder why it happened in this crossover, rather than in his own title. He teams with Doctor Solar to stop an oil fire in Northern Alberta after which Solar asks him for help in stopping his future self from destroying the universe. As one does. Supreme, all beardy here, agrees, and then waxes a bit lyrical about how upset he is to find the heroes he's returned to after 50 years in space little more than corporate mercenaries. And all of a sudden, the anger he displays is slightly, but only slightly, mitigated, and the tear that we see in his eye at the end of the first issue is perhaps explained. I guess the idea is that Superman returns after 50 years to find the DCU populated by narcissistic assholes.

Am I giving Supreme too much credit for self-awareness here? I'm not sure.

Anyway, what Deathmate gives us is a brief look at a more thoughtful Supreme. Not quite the naive paragon of Justice of Alan Moore's run, but certainly more of a hero.

To be continued.

(Edit - I forgot to say that the apocalypse that threatens the universe is demonstrated in the far-flung apocalyptic future of April 8, 2018! Don't say you weren't warned!)